Climate change. Hot or cold, wet or dry, has it affected you this year yet?

[babylonsister]

I've had more than normal spiders, bees and dragon flies, not to mention rain. It's still summer here in October. x( I want screens and fresh air!

[Blashyrkh]

1. Brisbane, Australia.

We've had 4 days of storms after months of nothing, capped off with a rollicking thunderstorm at 9am this morning.

Dunno if it's global warming, but it sure is unusual.

[babylonsister]

2. So you're saying you finally got rain? I heard parts of AUS have been

suffering. What is the weather there usually?

[Blashyrkh]

25. Yeah, this has been the wettest week I've seen for at least 12 months, if not longer.

We don't have it as bad as some places though.

Most of the rain we've been getting is piddly little showers that barely wet the ground. Even after this week, we still haven't had the week of solid, torrential rain that might start to turn things. It's looking better for this summer though.

You should look up some of the water restrictions we've got. Recommended daily limit of 140 litres (36 gallons) per person for EVERYTHING. I'm talking showers, dishwashing, clothes, cleaning, toilet, anything. Outdoor hoses are effectively banned and if you wanna buy a swimming pool, you have to buy the water to fill it from a third party.

I still run a 410 litre (110 gallon) fish tank though.

[ananda]

3. YES

Much fewer birds, hardly any crickets, no frogs..
different patterns of rain and drought.. longer
summers.

[babylonsister]

4. No frogs? I agree with the different patterns. I have a tree that's had

a bloom or two at odd times all summer, when it usually only bloomed in the spring. I get frogs! My weird addition is they are still here; I am still seeing babies. When it rains, frogs enjoy.

[Hissyspit]

5. Are you kidding?

It's the almost mid-October here in SE North Carolina and it was in the 90s today! We set RECORD highs in my county last month - 108 degrees, previous record was 102 degrees and that was in 2002.

I can't remember the last time it rained! EXTREME drought throughout NC and SC. Worst I've ever seen it.

[babylonsister]

15. Wow. I'm sorry for you. A hurricane would have helped in an odd way.

You don't have mountains' run-off to depend on, do you? Like CA? (grasping at straws here)

[Hissyspit]

19. I forgot to mention: no rain in the forecast.

Actually, the hurricanes have kept us from extreme drought over the past few years, but nothing this year.

Far from the mountains.

[Colorado Progressive]

6. 9600 feet Colorado mountains, geraniums and clematis still blooming!

We have not even had a serious freeze, much less any actual snow! My ANNUAL flowers are thriving, as if I lived in Georgia or something. Usually we are lucky if we have any annuals left in early Sep. Also, the mice are rampant.

Usually by now we have gone through a cord and a half of wood. So far we have had 3 or 4 short-lived fires, maybe an eighth of a cord?

[HughMoran]

7. Nice weather - Sept 2 deg warmer than last year

Up here in the NE we have finally lost the heat and it's gonna be dank for the next few days :(

Dragonflies were above normal, though I've seen worse.

[maseman]

8. We had 88 degrees

and sun for the past five days in Ohio. It's friggin' October! The leaves have not even begun to change colors which is the first time in 30 years (all that I can remember) that that has happened. At this pace I will still be raking leaves while putting up Christmas lights.

very weird.

[babylonsister]

9. Ah! A question! Do leaves turn colors because of rain or heat or cold?

I've been meaning to look that up!

[Colorado Progressive]

10. Leaves turn color because of the amount of sunlight. As sunlight diminishes plants start storing

sugars in their root system. When weather cools quickly some of these sugars and photosynthetic pigments get trapped in the leaves as the leaves are being cut off from circulation, which is what causes the leaf to change colors. Complicated, as it really has to do with everything involved, but the lack of sunlight is what initially triggers the changes in the plant's behavior. I used to be a botanist for USFS, not making this up.

[babylonsister]

12. That makes perfect sense.

On Long Island this summer, I heard the leaves were turning early and was asked by a dear friend 'why'? They had the fire going in August, which was really strange.

So, the rain doesn't effect it so much as dark days and coolness. Thanks.

[Colorado Progressive]

16. Actually increased rain (at least what I have noticed here) tends to

cause more reds in our aspens. It encourages an increase in one of the sugars or pigments, dont remember which. I do know that long wet summers give us the best color in the fall.

[babylonsister]

18. For crying out loud, what's the reason? I'm begging you!

:P Maybe I will google it!

[Colorado Progressive]

20. Do! Google it and you will get a bunch of NPS and USFS employees

blundering about the way I am. It has to do with light, water, sugars, etc. But then the wind comes up and steals the leaves and robs you of the magic! x(

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

11. Unusually mild summer, wet fall. SW Washington.

And, I sure ain't complainin'.

[tnlefty]

13. We hit a new category for drought - exceptional!

Before we hit triple digit temps. for 2 weeks in August, dairy farmers weren't milking cows. In my area we're at -16 inches for rainfall, my pool is still open, but we'll be closing it soon. This isn't as it was when I was a kid.

I doubt that we'll be in much more than light long sleeves by Halloween, and I remember it being really chilly when I was younger.

[Colorado Progressive]

17. Doesnt it seem weird that the high temps are across the board?

I mean its not just little pockets of drought or heat waves, everyone seems warmer.

[tnlefty]

21. Yes, and here the leaves aren't turning the colors of fall.

They've been dropping helter skelter since mid August and the ones that are falling now didn't change colors, but died on the trees and fell and more of the green leaves are falling as well.

The temps. seem warmer here, but with extreme changes within a day or so. For example, last year the week before Easter we were in the 90's with the hottest day being 96 on Thurs. or Fri. The Saturday before Easter we had a hard freeze and woke up to 17 degrees on Easter Sunday. :crazy: Extreme, exceptional drought here, but for how many weeks were parts of OK and TX flooded this past spring/summer?

We've been having tornadoes and severe storm cells in NOVEMBER for the past 4-5 yrs., which was absolutely unheard of before.

[leftofthedial]

14. hotter, drier

I grew up about 600 miles south of where I now live

the climate here is getting more and more like where I grew up



many fewer songbirds and migratory birds (I live on the edge of a fairly big wetlands preserve)

food costs are higher

heating and cooling costs are higher

sunburns are much worse

[calteacherguy]

22. Hard to differentiate random occurances from those caused by climate change.

We are having early rains here in Northern California.

Edit: I heard the other day there is no snow on Mt. Shasta, which only happens once in decades, apparently. So maybe Mother Nature is making up for a dry year. Although as far as snow I heard farmer's almanac says it's going to be a wet and warm winter. I think California used to be like a tropical rainforest...

[distantearlywarning]

23. Not sure that our weather is due to climate change.

But it has been a strange year, that's for sure.

We had a tornado in August, possibly the first one ever for Pittsburgh.

Also, it's been basically July up until today. We hit 90 degrees yesterday. Should be more like 50-60 this time of year. We haven't had one week since August that it wasn't 80-90 degrees every day, until today (it dropped to a very chilly 70). That's extremely unusual for the area.

On Edit: No leaf changes to speak of either. Usually we are starting to see great color by this time also.

It's all really weird. It's like we haven't left summer behind at all. I keep forgetting it's supposed to be October, because it feels and looks like August.

[Blue Diadem]

24. We were using air conditioning two days ago, now it's 49 and dropping.

I took the BR window units out this evening. At least yesterday I was able to open windows since it had dropped from 89 the previous day to 70.

Bugs..lots of them some I've never seen before. Rainfall was weird this year. We began in mild drought, then August gave us an abundance. Now we could use some. I pulled up some of the big bushy cherry tomato plants this evening and found the ground had those big deep cracks.

edited to add: Our maple tree leaves turned color in a strange way this year. The top 1/2 of the tree turned color and most have dropped the last two days. The bottom of the tree is still green. In 20 years I've never seen that tree do that.

[leftchick]

26. Drought in NC

no rain since early July and none predicted. Many of my foundation shrubs and trees have died due to water restrictions. It is going to get worse. So much for my gardening for therapy!

:cry:

[marions ghost]

29. yes I know....

it is horrendous in the Southeast (especially away from the coast). Everything is burnt up.

Atlanta, Charlotte, and Raleigh are really in sad shape. Here is a webpage with some links about the drought all over North Carolina:

http://www.wsoctv.com/DROUGHT/index.html

:grouphug:

[malaise]

27. One Cat 5 hurricane swiped us

another Cat 5 passed 300 miles off our South coast (both in a fortnight) and as I type it's day six of heavy rain.

[adigal]

28. Upstate NY - was in the 80s this week, really low on rain

We have had an incredibly warm September and half of October. And we are down about 12 inches of rain this year from teh average.

[piedmont]

30. Drought in GA ravaged my garden, and I can't wash my car or I'll be out $1,000.

But we still have plenty of neat creepy-crawlies, which is ok with me! Just wish we had Texas' rain, dammit.

[Canuckistanian]

31. An excellent summer that lasted into October

And get this... we STILL haven't had a frost yet (normally comes in mid-September).